Benjamin Netanyahu’s Family Originally had the Surname Mileikowsky When They Came to Palestine from Poland in the 1920s

Benjamin Netanyahu’s family originally had the surname Mileikowsky, which was changed to the Hebrew name “Netanyahu” meaning “God has given” when his father immigrated to Mandatory Palestine from Poland.

This name change was a deliberate move to adopt a more Zionist identity and shed their European roots, reflecting the family’s ardent support for the Revisionist Zionist movement led by Ze’ev Jabotinsky.

The Mileikowsky family hailed from Warsaw, where Benjamin’s paternal grandfather Nathan was a rabbi and Zionist writer. His father, Benzion Mileikowsky, was born in 1910 and became a prominent figure in Revisionist Zionism, a militant and expansionist strain of Zionism that advocated for a Greater Israel encompassing present-day Jordan. Benzion lobbied extensively in the United States for the creation of Israel aligned with the Revisionist vision before eventually accepting the borders defined by the 1947 UN Partition Plan.